


put down your roots

by weatheredlaw



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Arguing, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Long-Distance Relationship, Love Confessions, Marriage Proposal, Minor Canonical Character(s)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-05
Updated: 2016-12-05
Packaged: 2018-09-06 16:11:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8759980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/weatheredlaw/pseuds/weatheredlaw
Summary: "I thought, perhaps if I die, if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see."





	

**Author's Note:**

> a response to an ask about how newt and tina would react to the other one being hurt that got _entirely_ out of hand.

_Miss Goldstein –_

_We are writing to inform you that at approximately 14:00 PM yesterday afternoon, Mr. Newton Scamander was admitted to our facilities for severe injuries due to an incident involving a wild hippogriff. If you are confused about your status as one of Mr. Scamander’s emergency contacts, or would like more information, please reply to this letter promptly through your region’s Office of Magical Correspondence (dir. Martin Screech)._

_Regards,_

_Deputy Richard Angler_  
European Front  
circa St. Mungo’s Western Emergency Offices

 

* * *

 

_Deputy Angler –_

_I will arrive via portkey tomorrow evening. Please forward your confirmation to your own region’s director for Magical Transportation (Helen Heartwig)._

_T. Goldstein_

 

* * *

 

He is asleep when she arrives at the makeshift St. Mungo’s facility. It’s a sturdy, pale green tent on the edge of a forest, surrounded by Ministry of Magic forces. No-maj’s and muggles have stopped fighting one war, and while another seems to be brewing already, Tina and her people have their own battle to fight.

Newt had found himself in the midst of it just after his book was published. Grindelwald had not remained in the States for long, slipping from their fingers almost as soon as they’d had him. Tina has suspected, more than once, that his two-week tenure with them had been manufactured, to an extent. That he had enjoyed toying with them, observing from behind enchanted glass.

(He’d asked Tina about Newt, only once. She’d been asked not to speak with him again.)

But Tina doesn’t want to think about Gellert Grindelwald as she takes up a vigil at Newt’s bedside. According to the healer in charge of his case, it had been an entire _herd_ of hippogriffs, captured and provoked by Grindelwald’s forces, and nearly let loose on a muggle hamlet just a dozen miles or so to the west. Newt had been the only thing standing in their way.

“Lucky he’s not dead.”

“What are his injuries?”

“Three broken ribs, hairline fracture of the skull, broken hand, crushed lung. We repaired a lot of it, but the potions are still doing their mending work on the bones. Honestly, he’d recover faster if he wasn’t already being run _ragged_ by this lot. Grindelwald’s got dragons, though, someone said.”

Tina has started reading a book, her breathing settling in time with Newt’s.

The word d _ragons_ makes her heart fold in, just a bit.

She turns the page.

 

* * *

 

“Quite a sight for sore eyes,” he murmurs.

Tina jumps at the sound of his voice, stolen from her for so long. She wants to crawl into his bed, envelope herself around him – but there are a dozen nurses in the room, and Tina is officially on loan from MACUSA and needs to report to the acting lead auror in just under an hour.

“Did you really throw yourself in front of a charging hippogriff?” she asks, instead of _why have you done this to me?_

“Not—” He hisses as he moves. Tina watches. He settles. “Not quite.”

“Then what, Newt?”

He stares at the ceiling. “She was scared,” he says. “I tried to show her I wanted to help, but…” Newt closes his eyes. “Is she alright?”

Tina nods. “I…I think so.”

“I’ll need to talk to Deputy Angler. Make sure they don’t hurt her, or the rest of the herd. My mother has places for them to go, acreage where they can be rehabili—” He begins coughing, a wretched, sawing noise.

Blood trickles from the corner of his mouth.

“I’ll get the healer—”

“ _No._ ” Newt grabs her wrist, smears blood along the swell of bone. “No. I’m fine.”

“You need _rest._ You shouldn’t be out here. That’s not because of your lung, you’ve had that haven’t you?”

“Only—” Another cough. “Only for a while.”

“You’re no good against Grindelwald if you’re dead, Newt.” It comes out sharper than she intends, but he doesn’t even flinch. Only stares at her, watching as she fetches the closest nurse.

She doesn’t come back. She goes to her meeting, and sleeps alone in her tent.

(There is something about self-destruction that simultaneously draws Tina in and repels her, all at once.

She has a knack for falling into the sort of things that will ruin her.)

 

* * *

 

He’s sitting up the next time she comes by, flipping through the book she’d left behind. Tina returns to her seat, folding her hands in her lap.

“I’m sorry I left you.”

Newt’s eyes remain on the page, hair that has grown far too long hanging in his face. “It’s quite alright,” he says. “I rather deserved it.” He finally glances up. “I had bronchitis six weeks ago. I…did not care for it properly. Having my lung, ah, _crushed_ only seemed to exacerbate the issue.”

Tina tries to stifle a laugh, but it bursts from her without warning. A few nurses look up disapprovingly.

“I’ve been waiting for you to smile,” Newt murmurs, and takes her hand in his. “And I’d like to promise,” he adds, “to take better care of myself.”

“Please come back to New York with me. We’ll get you a good healer, and you can work on all this with MACUSA, we’ll get you an office—”

“Tina, you know I can’t do that.”

She worries her lip. “I’d rather you did.”

His hand grips hers. “I won’t see them used. They’re only trying to survive. And if there are really dragons, if we are so far gone—”

“I know,” Tina says, lifting his hand and pressing it to her lips. “ _I know._ ” She holds his palm to her cheek, feeling his thumb stroke her temple. “It has to be you, doesn’t it?”

“I’m afraid so.”

 

* * *

 

The hippogriff that attacked Newt is separated from the herd. When he is well enough to stand and walk, he takes Tina to see her.

She is erratic, the handlers say, and they are grateful for Newt’s calming presence. Tina watches as Newt gives the creature her space and bows. It is a delicate dance, one that pays off when she kneels and lets him touch her. “Good girl,” he murmurs. “Such a good girl. You didn’t mean to do anything wrong, did you?”

Tina wraps herself tighter in her coat, unable to look away.

 

* * *

 

Deputy Angler says half the herd will need to be put down.

Newt Scamander has a _conniption._

It is the strangest thing, Tina thinks, to watch a man so married to silence and engaged to his awkward pauses _explode_ on a superior officer. Angler _cowers_ in front of him as Newt’s fury grows too large for the room, too great for one continent to handle.

“If you dare level a single wand at any of those creatures, so help me I will make your life a living _bloody_ nightmare—”

“Mr. Scamander—”

“This is what _he wants_ ,” Newt snarls. “He wants you to destroy the last remnants of what is good in this world. And he wants you to do it of your own volition. He wants it to be _your idea_.”

“There’s no _room_ for them—”

“I will make room. This world has space.”

Angler stands up straight. “Then you have forty-eight hours, Scamander. Forty-eight hours, or my team acts.” He peers behind him. “That includes you, Goldstein.”

Newt turns on his heel and storms out of Angler’s tent.

“Newt.” Tina runs after him. “ _Newt._ ”

“Did you know?” he says, turning on her. “I need you to be very honest with me, Tina.”

She stands very still, hands and limbs frozen.

His anger is so palpable, so very _raw_ –

Tina wishes deception were her strong suit.

“Yes,” she says weakly. “This morning, during our briefing. They said the herd was…was too large to relocate in its entirety. But I didn’t want to—”

“It’s not your fault,” he says, and continues walking.

“Well you’re doing a poor job of making sure I don’t feel that way.”

Newt shakes his head. “I’m not responsible for your emotional responses. If you’d like to shoulder the blame, that’s your decision.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

“I have to take care of them, Tina.”

“Do you?” She stops. It’s drizzling. It is _always drizzling._ “Who made them your responsibility?”

“The Ministry—”

“Let’s make a deal, Newt.” She goes to him, taking his face in her hands and forcing him to look at her. “If I’m not allowed to blame myself, then you’re not allowed to shift your own onto someone else.” Tina lets her hands drop to her side. “You chose to be here. You chose to take this on. You chose to _run yourself ragged_ and now you’re sick and you’re _angry_. I don’t have to be here, Newt. I can go back to New York tonight.”

“Then go,” he says. “If you hate it here so much, if I infuriate you to such a degree, then leave. I will survive without you.”

Tina swallows. “You made me your emergency contact.”

“Because I trust you. Because my father is bed ridden, and because my mother cannot leave his side. My brother is one of a dozen aurors standing between Grindelwald and the destruction of London.” He finally, _finally_ looks at her. “My family is in pieces, Tina. They asked me to name someone, anyone to contact if something should happen to me. I put down you, because I thought, perhaps if I die, if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see.

“I decided that I was alright with that.”

Tina _snarls_. “You’re _selfish_ ,” she says. “If you wanted to tell me you loved me, you could have just _said it_.”

She doesn’t stay long enough to watch his reaction.

(There is a war in her world and in this countryside and another in her bones.

Tina succumbs to the ache of battle, and retreats home.)

 

* * *

 

 _Miss Goldstein_ –

_There has been an incident. You are listed as my brother’s primary emergency contact. I am authorizing a portkey for you to take here immediately._

_He asks for you. I can’t go into more detail. But he asks for you._

**_Theseus Scamander_ **

 

* * *

 

“He’s been delirious for three days. Says all sorts of things.”

Theseus Scamander appears calm, relatively aloof, but his voice betrays his panic. Tina doesn’t have to look to hear it. She’s felt it before, watching Queenie get herself into one spot of trouble after another.

“Damn dragons.”

Tina watches through the glass of Newt’s room at St. Mungo’s. He’s asleep, but Theseus tells her it comes in fits and bursts.

He says her name.

“I didn’t know who you were. Angler told me.”

Tina closes her eyes. “Are the hippogriffs alright?”

Theseus falters. “The—” Then: “Oh. Oh you mean the herd.”

“Yes.”

“Ah. No, actually. They had to put a little less than half of them down. There was nowhere to put them. Newt only managed to relocate a handful. Our mother took some of them in, and a few of her friends in the trade, but…” Theseus swallows. “Everyone needs to keep a low profile. Moving twenty hippogriffs around the country would have been difficult, even outside of the war. Possible, yes. But right now—”

Tina opens the door and steps inside.

Theseus says, “Is that what did it, then? Pushed him over the edge?”

“Did he do something stupid?”

“Yes.” Theseus braces himself on the metal end of Newt’s bed. “Threw himself off a cliff trying to save a drake.” And now he chokes. Chokes on words and sentiment. “Shouldn’t be so dramatic about it. It wasn’t steep. But he nearly killed himself. I think Grindelwald knows he’ll do it. I think he’s messing with us, messing with Newt’s head.” Theseus bows his own, a man in prayer. “He won’t listen to me. Healer says his brain might be cooked from the fever, that he might never be right again, but I don’t believe that.”

Tina swallows. “What do you believe?”

“I believe Newt loves you, and I believe he’ll listen if you tell him to stop killing himself.”

“I tried that.”

Theseus goes to her, putting a hand on her elbow. “Please. Try again.”

 

* * *

 

The episodes last a few more days. Newt thrashes in a panic. The healer says they’ve done what they can for the burns, have repaired the skin on his back and arms, but the damage to his brain may be irreparable, if it has been done.

“There’s no way to tell until he stops reacting. I think there’s trauma, but I can’t do anything about it until he’s stable. I’m terribly sorry, Mrs. Scamander.”

Tina looks up. “I’m not his wife.”

“Oh.” The healer flushes. “Oh, I’m sorry. He only…he asks for you. You are—”

“I’m Tina,” she says.

“Right. Ah, terribly sorry.” He nods quickly and disappears.

Tina abandons her chair and crawls into Newt’s bed as soon as he goes.

_I thought, perhaps if I die, if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see._

“What about the first?” she murmurs, resting her hand over his heart. “How about you live, Newt? And I’ll be the first face you see.” She takes his hand, kissing his knuckles. “I’ll be the first thing you hold.”

 

* * *

 

(In her dream, she falls backwards over the cliff and it is steeper than Theseus told her.

In her dream, she is the dragon.

In her dream, he is the dragon.

In her dream, he says her name—)

“Tina.”

She opens her eyes. His fingers are in her hair, twisted gently. She lifts her head, and without another thought, she throws her arms around his neck, holding him as tight as she can. “You stupid, _stupid_ man. I can’t believe—” Tina chokes. “ _I can’t believe_ —”

“It’s alright dear. It’s alright.”

“Are you _trying_ to die?”

“No,” he says quickly. “I am not.”

She trembles. “I’m sorry about the herd. Newt, I’m so _sorry_ about—”

“Please,” he says, pressing his thumb over her lips. “Please, Tina, don’t.”

She sobs, now. Open mouthed and _aching._ Bless the solitude of this room, she thinks. Bless the man in this bed. Bless the hands that hold her.

( _I saw your agony, and I ran. I saw your pain and I abandoned you. I saw you at your weakest, and I was afraid._ )

“I will never treat you that way again,” he says. “I will never speak to you that way, for as long as I live.”

“Newt—”

“I treated you like the rest of them, like you didn’t understand and you didn’t care.” He shakes under her body, _his_ entire body, rail-thin and shuddering. Bones vibrating, muscles and tendons screaming out. “You are like no one, Tina. No one I’ve ever met.”

“Tell me you love me.”

“I love you.”

Tina moves closer. “Say it again.”

“ _I love you._ ”

“Once more.”

Newt closes his eyes, and their foreheads touch, they breathe together, they are here, existing as a single, living thing.

“I will always love you.”

 

* * *

 

As he heals, Tina goes. She is not on loan, this time around. She is needed in New York. Newt cannot leave his hospital bed, and Tina cannot take a portkey out of it, so she spends her last hour tucked behind him, a pair of scissors in her hand.

“You hate my hair, don’t you?”

“I can’t stand the way you let it cover your eyes.”

“It’ll grow on you.”

Tina sighs. “I’m cutting the back at least, Newt. You look ridiculous.”

“Agreed,” Theseus says, coming in and setting Tina’s suitcase by the door. “Hate to interrupt, but we need to get you home, Ms. Goldstein.”

“Almost done.” She takes off one last bit before running her hands through it. “Better.” Theseus steps out to give them a moment as Tina wraps Newt in her arms. “I love you,” she murmurs.

“How very convenient.”

“Please be careful,” she says, untangling herself from his bed and limbs.

“So long as you promise to do the same.”

Tina nods, reaching out and drawing him in to kiss him goodbye. “I promise.”

 

* * *

 

They are funny things, though. Promises.

Terribly funny. Delicate, too. Easily broken.

 

* * *

 

In the space between living and dying, Tina sees the moon.

(Her mother had a story for it. She thinks she can hear Queenie telling it. She can feel her sister near her, and their shared pain is a feedback loop, moving from one to another. Tina knows it isn’t helping, but she swears if her sister goes from her she’ll scream and she’ll scream and she’ll _scream_ —)

_I thought, perhaps if I die, if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see._

(She asks for Queenie.

She knows she asks for Newt, and in the same breath she begs them not to send for him, not to tell him what’s happened. She made a promise. She loves him and she’d promised and they have hurt each other enough.

But still.

She asks for him.

She says his name and she screams and she cries and the pain is so angry, it is so real and fierce in her body—)

_I thought, perhaps if I die, if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see._

 

* * *

 

Newt’s hand is on her forehead, brushing the damp strands of hair away from her face. Tina stares at the ceiling.

“Tina?”

She wants to speak. She does, truly.

(They say the curse may have robbed her of it. Could have been worse, the healer says. She could have lived with the pain for the rest of her life.

Screaming in agony.

Screaming his name.)

“Tina, dear.”

She wants to speak.

She does.

Truly.

Newt swallows. “I’ll stay here,” he says. “Until you’re well again, I’ll stay here.”

 

* * *

 

She knows the nurses try to run him off, usually when the healer comes by to try and restore Tina’s voice. Tina exists within these spaces – the spaces of Newt coming and going, promising her he’ll be right back. The spaces of her healer casting a different spell every day. Tina wants to tell them that she is hardly living, and that if they would leave her with Newt –

_–your face might be the last one I see._

“I managed to save one of them,” he tells her. “The one that tried to kill me.” How fond of her he sounds. “Mother took her in. We call her Louise. She’s quite gentle, really.” Newt strokes her hand.

Queenie is there every day. Sometimes she convinces Newt to come back to the apartment with her to clean himself up and have a meal, to say hello to Jacob. Sometimes they both sit and read in silence. Queenie has to work still, but they’re being generous.

A healer comes by to talk about their options.

“Your wife may never speak again.”

“She’s not…” Newt stumbles. “I mean—” A quick breath. “There must be something.”

“Our only other option is to wait out the curse. It could go away on its own.”

Tina stares at the ceiling.

The world goes by.

She is bound to this, like all other things.

And Newt’s face is the last one she sees before sleep takes her.

 

* * *

 

And then, croaking in the night, escaping from her lips like a brook in the woods, spilling out and washing over stones and roots –

“ _Newt._ ”

He sits up, blinks through sleep. “Tina?”

“Newt—” Tina feels something inside her snap, and it _rushes_ out, a brook becoming a river, a river becoming a flood.

She screams.

 

* * *

 

“We suspect the caster must have…died.” Percival Graves stands awkwardly at the end of her bed.

(He is always awkward, now. More cautious. Still Percival, but—)

“And that fixed it? Just like that?” Queenie grips Tina’s hand in hers.

Tina swallows. “I’ll take whatever answer you can come up with, sir.”

Graves nods. “Understandable. Take as long as you need to rest, Tina. We’ll be at this a while.”

Newt’s gaze follows him as he leaves before turning back to the two of them. “I must send a letter,” he says, and leans forward to kiss Tina’s forehead. “I won’t be long.”

Queenie sighs after he’s gone. “That man loves you.”

“I know,” Tina says, leaning back against her pillows.

“You need to stop feeling guilty about that day, Tina.”

“Maybe later,” she murmurs, closing her eyes.

“It’s always later with you. You don’t even have anywhere else to put all of it. You’ve got enough guilt stored up already.”

“What’s a little more?”

“Too much, is what it is.” Queenie shakes her head. “It’s too much.”

She goes home just before Newt returns, perching himself on the end of her bed. He looks anywhere but her face, and Tina finally manages, “You have to go, don’t you?”

“Tomorrow.”

“…Oh.”

“They wanted me back last week, but I told my brother to tell them that…that I was indisposed.” He sniffs. “Angler thinks you’re my fiancé. Or he’s pretending that’s how it is, anyway. There’s more dragon rumors floating about—”

“Don’t.”

“Tina, please.”

“If you leave me here, and if you go and _die_ —”

“I promise I won’t.”

Tina closes her eyes. “We need to stop doing that,” she says. “It never goes the way it should.”

Newt sighs, moving to lie next to her. “I know.” He curls up against the headboard, tucking her head against his chest. “But I need to finish what I started. You can understand that. Can’t you?”

Tina nods. “Yes,” she says, as quiet as she can manage.

(No part of her wants to admit he is right.

All of her wants to seal the two of them away until the world is as right as it can be once more.)

Newt kisses the top of her head.

“It’ll be over soon. You’ll see.”

Tina wants to believe that.

She wants to, so very much.

 

* * *

 

_Miss Goldstein –_

_Newt is fine. I should probably get that out of the way. He would be furious to know I asked you to come. Our father has passed, and while I cannot say what kind of loss it is for my brother, I know it is devastating enough that he has retreated wholly into himself._

_As per usual, a portkey has been secured for you, should you choose to come._

**_Theseus_ **

 

* * *

 

He is outside with the hippogriff when she arrives, and he is a bit of a mess.

“…Newt?”

He turns, watching her cross the yard with a curious look, as if he isn’t quite sure of her.

Tina reaches out, touching his face with both hands. He closes his eyes, and falls into her space.

“It’s alright,” she says.

(She has seen him cry, of course.

She has not felt it.

Not like this.)

Death shatters reasonable norms when it arrives on your doorstep. They fall into his bed, mouths and hands reaching everywhere they can manage. Newt’s breath is heavy, Tina’s heart is hammering –

“I’m very happy you’re here,” he manages.

“I’m sorry, Newt. I really am.”

He has a knee on either side of her hips, and he stares down at her, watching.

“Will you marry me?” he asks.

Tina _balks._ “What?”

“Oh.” He sits up. “Oh this is a terrible time to ask, isn’t it?”

“A little.”

“I just—” He stands, running a hand through his hair and talking to the ground. “I only thought that you might…that we—”

“Newt. Your father is dead. You have to bury him tomorrow.”

“I’m aware.”

Tina sighs, standing and crossing the room to him. She pushes herself under his chin, wrapping her arms around his chest. Newt stills before he reaches for her, holding her close. “We’ll table this one,” Tina murmurs. “Come back to it later.”

“Yes, alright.”

She looks up. “Newt?”

“Hmm?”

“I love you, you know that.”

“I do.”

She pushes the hair from his face. “If things weren’t…this way, I’d—”

He puts a thumb over her lips. “Don’t…don’t finish that sentence. It’s alright.” He kisses her. “You don’t owe me a thing.”

 

* * *

 

The war doesn’t recede, but the need for Newt’s particular skillset seems to dwindle. Tina doesn’t hear him complain.

The world is still trembling, of course, and there are moments where they are not sure if the other is still alive, but—

It is better than before.

On New Year’s Eve, they are in Paris, and Newt gets down on one knee and produces the most beautiful ring Tina has ever seen.

“I believe this is a more appropriate time to ask.” Tina nods, doesn’t trust herself to speak. “Excellent.” He can hardly look at her, his nervousness is palpable.

Tina gets down on her knees as well, and she grips his hands in hers. “It’s a perfect moment.”

“Will you, then? Marry me?”

Tina nods. “I will.”

Newt laughs, taking her hand and sliding the ring on her finger. He laces them together, tipping forward into her space – their space. “Thank you for taking care of me.”

“I couldn’t just let you go,” Tina says. “And you took care of me, too, Newt.”

“It certainly doesn’t feel that way.”

“I feel that way.” She holds his face in her hands. “I will always take care of you.”

“And I, you.”

Above, fireworks arc into the sky, signaling the end of one year, and the start of another. The war is far from over, and their life is far from perfect –

_But if I am bound to it, then your face might be the last one I see._

And Tina is alright with that.

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr @weatheredlaw


End file.
